Are these pics overexposed? I thought I was doing good.

Good evening all.

It's been a while since I have had a chance to post on the boards but been busy at work and with the kiddos.

Yesterday was my first opportunity to shoot some soccer since the season started because of all the rain and what not we have had in Texas. Anyway, a friend of mine was looking at them and thought they were overexposed. Call me crazy but I thought they were pretty good myself.

Can someone...a few someones have a look at the 4 or 5 that I posted here and tell me what you think? Are they truly overexposed? I shot with my 30D and the Sigma 70-200 in TV mode. SS was about 1/1600...if I slow it down anymore than that, the kids are all fuzzy.

Thanks for looking and giving me your comments. By the way, my boy is in the first two pics.

1.

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The answer is yes. Just look at your histogram, it is hard right with clipped highlights. Do you prefer to shoot TV? Why are you using f/8 when you could use f/2.8? A quick check of your histogram after a couple of shots would have shown you were blown out. This was a bright sunny day and you were at ISO 640.

My setting for soccer would be: AV, Center point focus, AI Servo, ISO 100/200, F/2.8. With those setting your shutter will range from 1/2500 to 1/6000 depending on the sun and you location.

Here is a quick edit, lowered exposure one full stop

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Agreed - over exposed.

Dropping ISO to 100/200 as vetkrazy suggested will mean you need to drop down (or make wider) the aperture, and why not to around f/2.8-f/4? You'll find that a speed of no less than 1/500 will still give you sharp shots, but the wider aperture will give nicer bokeh blur) in the background and make that less distracting, thus bringing the focus back onto the subject - the players.

The only other consideration is the mass of green around, usual to find on a football pitch! Try dropping exposure by -1/3 to -2/3 to compensate for this.

I haven't looked at the histogram but, the images look too contrasty and over saturated.
The contrast may be because of the prevailing light conditions but I'm sure you could lower the saturation a bit.

Definitely over-exposed... yea you shouldn't be at such a high iso on a bright day like that. Also - yea if you're feeling up to it, open the aperture for nice seperation...

The images you've posted here would appear to be (at least visualy) toward the right of the histogram...

Yes, they are over-exposed. Parts of the white shirts are completely blown and have lost all detail.

Another alternative, which I use, is to shoot M. I meter off the grass, then depending on the histogram of an action shot might adjust +/- 1/3 stop. Like others have said, iso 100 or 200 for sure, and open up the aperature. I know a lot folks here get good results using Av, but I don't. I've tried and my exposures are all over the place. Maybe it depends some on the uniform color.

If you want to improve these shots use the shadow/highlights tool under the image...adjustment menu. You'll probably need to bring the hightlight slider up anywhere from 5 to 15. You'll never get back the blown highlights, but this will improve them for sure. I like to do this on a copy of the background layer then set the blend mode to luminosity to keep the colors from getting too wonky.

Wouldn't looking at histogram of the subject face be better guide to judge exposure than the histogram of the whole picture? I would guess if face is exposed correctly and white uniform is blown out, it still better than under-exposed face and properly exposed white uniform.

Willstar....I had no idea my ISO was still set so high....crap! The last time I took pics was indoors at a basketball game.

Fordmondeo - I didn't saturate at all in fact. The uniforms as well as the grass are very vibrant but not because of me this time.

Guys, I haven't had any luck shooting in AV at all. I get so frustrated when I get home and have absolutely no keepers. I'm going to give it another though. I'm still bummed that my ISO was set so high...normally I check those things but we got to the game right when it was starting...yada yada yada.

Thanks so much for the responses. I'm going to give AV a try this Saturday and will post again.

Karman

bobbyz wrote in post #5326240
Wouldn't looking at histogram of the subject face be better guide to judge exposure than the histogram of the whole picture? I would guess if face is exposed correctly and white uniform is blown out, it still better than under-exposed face and properly exposed white uniform.

I'd agree with this. If they are over-exposed, its only by a teeny bit. The white shirts will blow out, its a very sunny day. The faces looks ok to me. A little bit of fixing is required, not much. Good shots by the way!

No these are not over exposed. Is the sky and white shirts overexposed? Yes, but since when have we been able to expose an entire out side mid day scene perfectly. I think the faces were exposed correctly.

nickybegood1998 wrote in post #5326336
Guys, I haven't had any luck shooting in AV at all. I get so frustrated when I get home and have absolutely no keepers. I'm going to give it another though. I'm still bummed that my ISO was set so high...normally I check those things but we got to the game right when it was starting...yada yada yada.

Thanks so much for the responses. I'm going to give AV a try this Saturday and will post again.

Karman

I am always surprised when I hear this. I would agree that if the light is constant and you don't change the lens position in relation to the sun, TV or M will work just fine. The problem I have with TV is that as the light changes it will close down your shutter to compensate and the last thing I want is that background coming into focus. I always shoot wide open ( f/2.8 ) for sports, so that means AV or M. Since I shoot at many stadiums and fields that have stands that shade the home plate area but leave the infield and outfield bathed in bright sun, M does not cut it. Before the game starts I meter three areas: home plate, infield and outfield. I adjust my ISO to keep my shutter fast enough at home but not to fast to blow out the infield/outfield. During the game, every couple of innings I do a quick check to make sure my setting are still okay. Late afternoon, twilight games are another story, constant juggling! Besides baseball and softball I shoot track and field, tennis, cross country, football and soccer all in AV.

vetkrazy, when you are shooting the players in a sport what part of the players body do you focus on? I also try and shoot at 2.8 in baseball and soccer but find I lose the tight sharpness. If I focus on the player's face I typically get too much dead space above the player. Any suggestions?

I focus on the face. Move your focus point to single point and top center.